“Hairo… Tell all the ones that turned undead… They can’t go into Dis. It’ll kill them!”
“Got it. I’ll pass it on. I’m going to take the sick men to a clinic that accepts noncitizens. But I have to warn you, their bills are big.”
“Not a problem. How’s Gyula himself?”
“He’s fine. The other three… We have to hurry. Over and out.”
Hairo’s face disappeared. I slowly slid down the wall onto the floor; my legs gave out. Two deaths! Two humans. Someone’s sons, husbands, fathers. Dead because of Dis. It may be an important game, but it was still just a game! And if it was because they turned undead… I’d turned them practically with my own hands. Worse, I’d enabled the global infection of hundreds, if not thousands of players! Who would themselves go on to infect others… And there would surely be noncitizens among them. It began to seem more and more obvious that their capsules differed from ordinary ones in far more than just the limit on levels.
“Are you alright, Alex?” Roj extended a hand and helped me get up.
“No, Roj. I’m not alright…”
I gathered my thoughts, then called Kiran, but got no answer, just: Recipient has blocked you. The comm left by Yoshi went straight to the answering machine.
“He’s busy,” Roj said, nodding at the comm.
“Apparently so.”
“You know, when I was in the army, one day I got two bad pieces of news…”
“Oh, God, Roj, don’t start!” Maria said from her position by the door with the activity scanner.
“What news?” I asked mechanically, still deep in thought.
“My mother died in a terrorist attack and my fiancee broke up with me, said she was in love with someone else. A friend of mine, as it happens, but that’s irrelevant. The point is that in a single day, I’d lost a mother, a bride and a friend. And I was as aggrieved then as you are now. Our sergeant must have gotten some bad news that day too. He sent us out on a fully loaded march. I don’t remember when it happened; when I fell from tiredness, when I couldn’t see for the bloody circles in my eyes, but my grief… No, it didn’t go away. But it faded. It stopped strangling me and tearing my heart, let me go on living.”
“What are you getting at, Roj?”
“That asshole from Snowstorm ain’t gonna answer, but without talking to him, you’re gonna be off-balance. The weather’s nice. I say we go for a run.”
“No, thanks. Yesterday was enough for me. I can’t even walk right now…”
After decisively declining Roj’s offer, nonetheless, ten minutes later I was running side by side with him and Maria on the now familiar route. Both bodyguards were silent. I couldn’t even hear them breathing. But Roj was right. It cleared my head, and after a quarter of an hour I couldn’t think of anything but the run itself. My body thought it was dying and hooked up the extra reserves, sending hormones into my blood. Hidden by a thick canopy of fir and pine, we followed the edge of a lake to an impassable thicket where I was allowed to take a breather and drink from Roj’s flask. Then we ran back.
Just as we got home, Kiran called himself.
“I thought it was you, Alex. Well, congratulations, you’re a global star!” he said without smiling when he saw me. He looked annoyed. “What do you want?”
“Mr. Jackson, I’ve held up my end of the bargain. I’m willing to delete my character, but first I want to ask…”
“No.”
“No?”
“No, you haven’t held up your end of the bargain. You did not complete the Nucleus’s quests. Worse, you failed them. There will be no deal.”
Blood rushed to my face, but I mentally counted to ten I could speak as calmly as possible.
“Then I have no other choice but to develop my potential to the maximum, Mr. Jackson.”
“Are you threatening me?” He rolled his eyes. “Listen here, Sheppard. All of Snowstorm is having to deal with the consequences of your foolish actions. The introduction of the new faction did not go according to the script, and all because you couldn’t complete a simple quest! You found the cultists of Morena, didn’t you? You did! So tell me, in the name of all that is holy, what stopped you from turning them undead?” I couldn’t tell if he was faking anger or if he really was furious, but it looked scary either way. He was shouting, his eyes wide, spittle flying. “And now that the lich is dead, you’re the sole legate of a faction whose number is limited to the number of the fucking legates themselves!”
“I can fix it all!”
Kiran thought a moment, shook his head, answered calmly:
“You can’t do anything. The Nucleus’s AI has begun its game. The only thing you’re capable of doing is removing your minions from the desert and destroying the temple on Kharinza. Once you do that, call.
Perhaps, I repeat, perhaps, we will return to the conversation we had in Dubai. Until then, don’t you dare disturb me! Were having enough trouble without you.”
Kiran cut the call.
“Dickhead,” Maria swore. “You aren’t going to do it, are you?”
“To make everything stop, sure I will. Or I would, if I had a guarantee. But he didn’t have me any guarantees, and I don’t trust him.”
The day had begun so well, and now it was deep in the shittiest shitter I could think of. That dumb dream, the deaths of the noncitizens, now this. As far as Snowstorm was concerned, I could go to the Nether. They’d given me an ultimatum with no guarantees. Now it was me against all of them. While the money—mine and the clan’s—was in Dis, it
